Thanksgiving Weekend with Tracy

My blogging has been lacking again lately! Since I'm averaging only 2 posts a month lately, I thought I'd try to get an early start in December. We had a great Thanksgiving weekend, although Jon & I both ended up with the 24-hour stomach/flu/yuck bug.

We were so happy to be able to host an International Student for the long weekend. We did this through Hope Community Church, and a few other families from our church joined us as well. Tracy arrived Thursday morning and we were so excited to have her with us! She is from China and currently attending Fairfield University in Connecticut to get her MBA. She has only been in the US for 3 months so this was obviously her first Thanksgiving and even the first time she had eaten turkey. We had quite the busy day! We went to Jon's parents for dinner, then later to his aunt & uncle's house for more food! After that we went to Chocolate World, because how can you visit this area without going to Hershey?! On Friday I decorated for Christmas and Tracy had a day trip with the other international students to visit the Amish. We then met back at Hope Community for a HUGE potluck dinner (my favorite!). Also, each country represented gave a short presentation. Here's an interesting fact we learned that night: People in Australia do not actually say "G'day." The Austrailian student said she has never heard of that until she came to the US!

Saturday was not quite as great! I woke up feeling sick. Jon, Jackson, and Tracy went to the Fractured Prune and I stayed home to throw up. I was feeling terrible, and so sad because we had planned to get our Christmas tree that day. Jon started to feel sick later too, although not quite as bad. Tracy ended up spending the day with the Hixon's and their student. I was sad we missed that day with her, but I am so glad she was able to have fun with their family and bake cookies for the first time ever!

We had to take Tracy back to the church to meet the bus on Sunday afternoon. The weekend went way too fast! Jackson was especially sad to see Tracy go. At one point while she was holding him, she said "OK, bye bye Mommy and Daddy!" He cried when the bus left, saying he wanted to go on it. It's no wonder, because Tracy was so sweet with him all weekend. We hope she is able to come visit us again!

Here's a pic of Jackson & his new friend!

Jon and I are both feeling better. I am still not 100%, but good enough. We got our Christmas tree last night and planned to decorate it, but it was still a little wet, so we will decorate it tonight instead. Yay for Christmas! I just love the whole month of December, with the decorations , lights, and Christmas music!